On September 6, the director for Eastern Europe, Gleb Kostarev, and the director for the CIS, Vladimir Smerkis, announced their departure from the cryptocurrency exchange Binance. Both were responsible for the company’s operations in Russia.
Kostarev had worked at Binance for five years. In his post he thanked the exchange’s CEO Changpeng Zhao and co-founder Yi He for the trust and the opportunities provided.
In a comment to RBC added, Kostarev said that his departure from Binance “is not related to the latest events on the P2P platform and articles in Western media”.
Smerkis, who held the position for two years, promised to share the reasons for this decision later.
The departure was commented on by Changpeng Zhao. He explained it as moving to higher roles or into new projects.
Some of our team members are growing into bigger roles, some outside of #Binance. Some are doing new exciting ventures. I even made intros/references for many of them. We are supportive of everyone. We are one community.
This also creates more growth opportunities within…
— CZ ? Binance (@cz_binance) September 6, 2023
“This also creates more growth opportunities within Binance. Ignore the FUD, keep building,” added the exchange’s CEO.
As a reminder, in late August Binance removed from its P2P platforms the banks under American sanctions: Sberbank, Tinkoff and Alfa Bank.
The exchange also prohibited Russians from conducting exchange operations with any fiat currencies other than the ruble.
One of ForkLog’s consulted experts proposed considering blocking the restriction-imposing exchanges in Russia.
Against this backdrop, Binance representatives said they were studying, among other things, the possibility of a full exit from the jurisdiction. However, experts described such a scenario as “unlikely”.
Later in the exchange’s support, it was noted that Russian users would be able to withdraw funds in the event of the company’s departure from the country.